Itchy Lorikeet!!

[Emrarrr]

I apologise in advance for the lengthy post but this is really frustrating me and I really want to find out what is going on with my beloved boy!

Ok so I have a 3 year old DNA sexed male Rainbow Lorikeet who has been having a frustrating itching/night time wheezing issue for awhile on and off now. For some reason some nights he is totally fine and other nights I can hear a wheezing which is def through the nostrils (not a wet sound) it sounds like dust in his nares. At the moment he has been getting soooo itchy and he has little flip outs where he flits his wings quickly and looks down at his legs or chest and starts preening like crazy or flying around frantically. He preens a LOT and lately just seems really agitated. He is moulting currently and has been the past few months.

He has been to a very well respected Avian veterinarian several times and he is lovely enough to respond to my emails when I have worries but he has checked him over and says he is physically perfect, his lungs (air sacs) all sound great and his nares seem clear. He seems to think that it must be something such as an allergen that is irritating him. I never use beauty products or household products around him as I am super pedantic but we live in an old house which seems to get dusty fast and I have a cat and dog who seem to shed fur forever! I keep ontop of the vacuuming etc as much as possible.

Do you think it is likely he is sensitive to dust and or pet fur? Has anyone had this happen with their parrot? I spritz him with water daily and he has a bath everyday and he is fed Vetafarm wet mix plus fruit and vegetables and native flowers (free of pesticides).

Could his moulting be causing dander to get in his nostrils and make him so itchy? He has a habit of picking at his chest as well which has been put down to hormonal issues. It seems worse at the moment though. I guess I just want to know if anyone has experienced allergies in their birds? I was also wondering whether he could have giardiasis- apparently it is quite hard to test for.

Anyway, any info would be greatly appreciated! I'm fairly clued up with the medical aspect of it all but it seems I need some first hand experiences to help (eg other ppl with birds suffering allergies or difficult moults)

Thanks in advance

 

[sunnysmom]

Welcome to the forum. Have you tried using an air purifier to see if that helps?

@JAM ?

 

[JAM]

Welcome to the forum!

Sounds like from what you have posted his diet and routine looks ok. What kind of fruit and veggies do you give?
Has he had actually blood tests to see if there is something underlying happening?

Where do you live as in state/territory? Would you be able to put a humidifier in?

 

[Monica]

Not just blood tests, but skin and feather biopsies, too!

Giardia should not be hard to test for... the best thing to do is to take poop samples throughout the day, starting with the morning bomb and test that. Heck, you could take samples over 3 weeks to be sure! When I had my a-vet test for it, she only used one stool sample and it came back negative. I didn't feel it was necessary to do multiple samples, but it would have been the smart thing to do. The only reason it's so "hard" to detect is because it "sheds" intermittently, and it's a parasite.

 

[noice]

Try using a humidifier, it sounds to me like dry skin. If it doesn't clear up, take him to an avian vet.